Abstract
The Transforming Education for Sustainable Futures (TESF) India is part of a global south research network whose primary goal is to address key UN Sustainable Development Goals (SDGs) such as quality education, sustainable livelihoods, sustainable cities and communities, and climate action. Additionally, it focuses on cross-cutting themes of gender equity, reducing inequalities, and poverty. The network spans knowledge institutions in four countries: India, South Africa, Rwanda and Somalia/Somaliland, and is anchored by the University of Bristol, UK.
Over 2020–23, TESF India commissioned 23 research projects that covered a diverse range of areas, methods, geographical locations, and communities. These projects addressed diverse research questions and points of intervention with a focus on the SDGs. They range from exploring the meanings and purposes of education from the perspective of diverse marginalised communities to analysing how social, gender, economic, environmental, spatial, and epistemic injustices are sustained. The projects also delve into examining intersecting urban vulnerabilities and exploring methods of wider public engagement and social learning using performing and fine arts, and interdisciplinary approaches. They also investigate how school, higher education, professional education, and teacher education, can be transformed to foster critical knowledge, capacities, and agency among teachers and students towards building a socially and environmentally sustainable and just society.
This special issue of the journal on TESF India research brings together insights from six projects that cover various dimensions of these themes.
The work of TESF India is based on the recognition that sustainable development requires a critical application of sustainability concepts to local contexts. Over time, various approaches have shaped and refined the notion of sustainable development. These range from growth-focused strategies, emphasising “inclusive growth,” to environment-centered approaches, including those promoting “de-growth.” There have also been shifts from rights-based approaches that prioritise basic human needs to the capability approach, which concentrates on enhancing human capabilities and, to some extent, supporting the flourishing of natural systems (Tikly, et al., 2020).
Despite efforts to be inclusive and address diversity, these approaches continue to function within the prevailing development framework that prioritises the economic self-interest of certain regions and populations, over others. Decolonising approaches have broadened the concept of development to incorporate the perspectives and worldviews of the colonised and marginalised, urging us to confront the conceptual contradictions inherent in dominant development paradigms. For instance, the narrative of ecological degradation and livelihood loss is intertwined with modernity, development, and economic growth (Batra, et al., 2023).
Therefore, the fundamental question that arises is: What is it that we aim to sustain? And what type of education can empower us to contribute to the creation of sustainable and just societies and communities?
Yemuna Sunny’s research critically analyses the concept of sustainable development by collaboratively generating knowledge with the Bharias, an indigenous community residing in the Patalkot valley of Madhya Pradesh, a state in central India. The paper underscores that the Bharias have limited exposure to a selective range of knowledge through formal education. The construction of “common sense” within the dominant society marginalises tribal knowledge to a subaltern position, leading educated Bharia youth to forsake their traditional knowledge systems. Drawing on empirical evidence, the argument posits that education has been co-opted for the exclusive creation of knowledge for capital, a process that legitimates a specific form of development.
Chinmayi Jayakumar and her colleagues conducted research with four tribal communities— Bettakurumba, Kattunayakan, Mullakurumba, and Paniya—in the Gudalur region of Tamil Nadu. The paper highlights how Adivasi children face a disadvantaged entry into the mainstream school system, which fails to accommodate their language. The school environment reflects overt discrimination against the Adivasi community, perpetuated by both teachers and peers. Textbooks further contribute to this by portraying Adivasi communities through misguided narratives and stereotypes, neglecting the rich knowledge and diverse perspectives that Adivasi children bring to the classroom. The school assessment system, emphasising competition, clashes with Adivasi values of unity and cooperation that the children grow up with.
Proposing an alternative paradigm co-envisaged with the community, the paper advocates for an education system where the community and its village take precedence over the individual child, the economy, or the nation-state. In this envisioned model, education becomes a transformative process wherein both the community members and the school learn from each other. This approach empowers the Adivasi child to navigate the complexities of modernity from a position of strength.
In their research conducted with the Gond and Korku communities in the Kesla region of Madhya Pradesh, Aisha Kawalkar and her colleagues emphasise that formal school knowledge can be seen as a form of epistemic violence, particularly affecting tribal students. This is because it neglects any interaction with their worldview, culture, and social ethos, which are intricately connected to the natural world they inhabit.
The content in school textbooks portrays a perspective on nature conservation that contradicts the real-life experiences of these forest-dwelling communities. The authors argue that engaging in dialogue with both students and elders from Adivasi communities is crucial to establish a grounded understanding of forests and their conservation. The development of learning materials that are contextually relevant and meaningful has the potential to bring about transformative change. Grounded in the values of social and environmental justice, such materials could challenge the prevailing concept of development and offer alternatives that promote more inclusive, community-based approaches to nature conservation.
Samina Mishra’s research begins with the assertion that children’s perspectives are often marginalised in mainstream knowledge systems. Utilising an arts-based research methodology, Mishra illustrates how children actively contribute to the world and how their experiences can enrich our understanding of the current human condition. The argument posits that to broaden our comprehension of the world, we must derive meaning from children’s voices and integrate them into classroom learning. Listening attentively to children and incorporating their perspectives can prompt a re-evaluation of educational structures, fostering processes that promote social equity and justice.
An examination of children’s voices reveals that the discord between theoretical explanations presented in textbooks and children’s lived experiences can be addressed by focusing on the everyday aspects of their lives. The everyday context creates ruptures in the normative understanding of community, identity, and belonging, providing opportunities to deconstruct stereotypes.
By placing children’s voices at the forefront, a concept of citizenship emerges that goes beyond rights, emphasising care. This challenges us to reconsider the definition of a citizen—not just an individual entitled to liberty, equality, and fraternity, but someone deserving of care.
Incorporating the arts into the classroom facilitates a pedagogic communication method that transcends disciplines. This approach centers on children’s voices, agency, and adult–child dialogue. Examples of children’s creative expressions, such as poetry and art, serve as informative tools that enhance adult understanding with greater depth and nuance.
Sujata and Beena collaborated closely with a carefully chosen group of seven library educators from privileged backgrounds, delving into the theme of caste. The objective was to scrutinise their knowledge, attitudes, and practices concerning caste-related issues. This exploration involved activities such as reading caste literature, engaging in reflective discussions, and maintaining introspective journals. The overarching goal was to enhance their readiness to conceptualise, design, and pilot a library unit on caste specifically designed for children from privileged backgrounds.
Recognising that a significant segment of the upper-caste “educated” population in India perceives caste as irrelevant in their lives, considering themselves “casteless,” the project aimed to investigate how the privileged, through critical collective reading, could establish entry points for educational engagement on caste issues among children.
The findings shed light on the role played by the privileged in perpetuating the status quo, thereby reinforcing the existing unjust system of caste inequality. Addressing caste issues among the privileged necessitates overcoming resistance and critically examining one’s own privileges. This self-examination is crucial for engaging authentically with students on caste inequities and is integral to the broader process of social transformation.
Sayantan and colleagues investigated the lived experiences of transgender, gender non-conforming, and gender non-binary individuals within the Indian higher science education ecosystem. The objective was to comprehend how both active and passive denial contribute significantly to sustaining exclusion and discrimination processes within a policy environment that reinforces gender and social inequalities. The research offers comprehensive insights into the mechanisms that transgender, gender non-conforming, and gender non-binary individuals encounter when accessing science education.
The paper utilises autobiographical narratives from a Muslim intersex transgender student of science in an elite institution as vignettes, revealing how various mechanisms are employed to perpetuate exclusion in higher education science classrooms. These narratives illustrate how teachers resort to processes of deviant-making and abjection to reinforce exclusionary master narratives of cisnormativity within the classroom. The paper introduces two conceptual propositions— “epistemological deviant” and “epistemic abjection” —which have the potential to drive systemic and epistemic transformations within an exclusionary and discriminatory science ecosystem.
The research presented in this issue uncovers the ways in which social structures, norms, educational arrangements, curricula, and pedagogy perpetuate and sustain discrimination based on caste, community, and gender against marginalised groups, including Dalits, Adivasis, transgender individuals, non-binary persons, and children. A nuanced understanding of individuals and communities on the margins was achieved through research methods that facilitated knowledge co-creation with participants. Analysis of people’s lived experiences, local, and indigenous knowledge reveals the limited impact of formal education spaces and structures in altering hierarchies and power dynamics.
In international and national policy discussions, education is often touted as the bridge to help marginalised communities access and navigate the modern world. However, TESF India research exposes deep contradictions between the values and social ethos cherished by marginalised communities and what modern education offers them.
By privileging a universal, decontextualised knowledge, the formal curriculum tends to undermine and obscure knowledge systems and identities rooted in diverse social contexts and communities. This approach results in an education system that excludes and disempowers. Consequently, the longstanding question of addressing inequality in and through education in India, dating back to colonial times, remains overlooked.
Research with Adivasi communities highlights the interconnectedness of social and environmental justice, challenging the perceived disconnect between them. This prompts questions about the sincerity of policymakers and environmentalists in addressing these concerns. State-led environmental protection projects, such as the Satpura Tiger Reserve, may come at a significant cost to local Adivasi communities whose natural habitat comprises forests, rivers, and hills.
The papers underscore that education is a pivotal agent for a sustainable society, grounded in the principles of equality, liberty, justice, and fraternity. A truly transformative education restores agency to the marginalised, paving the way for a socially just and equitable society. The deliberative aims of education have been central to anti-caste and anti-colonial struggles in India since the early twentieth century. The current political climate in India underscores the need to revisit these political philosophies, as educational institutions become battlegrounds for competing ideologies.
It is imperative that marginalised communities, including Adivasis, are actively engaged in policy discussions concerning their education and future. Educators from privileged communities, and those that eulogise homogenised identities, must recognise, re-evaluate, and adjust the epistemic, ontological, and pedagogical contexts and assumptions they bring into their teaching. Co-creative research, drawing on interdisciplinary and local knowledge, demonstrates the power of challenging existing frames of dominant education and sustainability discourses while seeking solutions that directly benefit those affected by inequalities and sustainability challenges.